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Elections

Tough night for incumbants

Tuesday wasn’t exactly a great night for incumbents in a number of the state’s larger cities. Our non-exhaustive review of this year’s election results begins in Greensboro, where voters sacked a trio of City Council incumbents. The highest-profile of these was District 3 Councilman Zack Matheny, who heads Downtown Greensboro...

By Ray Gronberg

November 6, 2025

Meck transit tax passes

The returns late Tuesday evening are still both incomplete and unofficial, but Mecklenburg County voters appear to have approved the proposed 1-cent sales-tax surcharge to pay for transit and road construction. State Board of Elections figures with all but three precincts yet to report showed the tax referendum passing with...

By Ray Gronberg

November 5, 2025

New Congressional map unveiled

General Assembly leaders have rolled out their proposed Congressional redistricting, which is designed to make the First District seat in northeast North Carolina more favorable to a Republican candidate. The map change would affect 11 counties and also change the Third District, whose incumbent is Greenville Republican U.S. Rep. Greg...

By Ray Gronberg

October 17, 2025

New Congressional map incoming next week

Republican leaders in the General Assembly say they’re going to revamp the boundaries of North Carolina’s Congressional districts next week to give their party one more seat in the state’s U.S House delegation. In practice, that means the assurance of a 11-3 GOP delegation majority by making it a lot...

By Ray Gronberg

October 16, 2025

GOP First District field gains third contender

The GOP side of the race for North Carolina’s First District U.S. House seat is beginning to get a little crowded. Lenoir County Commissioner Eric Rouse announced this week that he’s joining a field that already includes state Sen. Bobby Hanig and Rocky Mount Mayor Sandy Roberson. Rouse indicated via...

By Ray Gronberg

October 9, 2025

Edwards gets a primary

U.S. Rep. Chuck Edwards, R-11th, appears likely to face a challenge in next spring’s Republican primary. Adam R. Smith, an Army veteran, announced his candidacy on Thursday. Via a news release, he said he’s running because he’s fed up “after a decade of watching liberal Marxism erode our Constitution, flood...

By Welcome

October 6, 2025

Berger bucks

Senate leader Phil Berger has raised 71 times as much money as his GOP primary challenger so far in in the 2025-26 election cycle, but his supporters aren’t taking it for granted that he’s got enough. Early in September, Martin Marietta CEO Ward Nye circulated a fundraising appeal to fellow...

By Ray Gronberg

September 25, 2025

Two incumbents trail in Charlotte council races

A low-turnout September primary is poised to turn a pair of Charlotte City Council incumbents out of office. Unofficial results indicate that District 3 and District 5 incumbents Tiawana Brown and Marjorie Molina lost their re-election bids, to challengers Joi Mayo and J.D. Mazuera Arias respectively. It remains to be...

By Ray Gronberg

September 11, 2025

Courthouse politics

Rural-county courthouse-crowd politics. That appears the ultimate explanation for why Senate leader Phil Berger and other Republicans in Rockingham County backed a Democrat, incumbent Ed Wilson, for a Superior Court judgeship in 2022. Going into the election cycle, Wilson had lined up support from lawyers, fellow judges and other key...

By Ray Gronberg

September 10, 2025

Berger rift

A group of coastal Republicans has demanded Senate leader Phil Berger’s exclusion from “any and all support from” the party, including access to its official and affiliated functions. According to the 3rd Congressional District’s Republican Party Executive Committee, Berger committed “party disloyalty” in 2022 when he endorsed a a Democratic...

By Ray Gronberg

September 9, 2025

Hanig runs for Congress

State Sen. Bobby Hanig, R-Currituck, says he’s going to run for Congress, which ensures that the Senate’s GOP caucus will have at least one new member in the 2027-28 session. On Wednesday, Hanig said he’s going to run for the 1st District seat currently held by U.S. Rep Don Davis,...

By Ray Gronberg

September 4, 2025

Map making

Gerrymandering congressional districts is the hottest topic of the month for state legislators in several states, but not so much in North Carolina. At least so far. That seems strange given that our state has earned a reputation as a particularly bad actor in gerrymandering, according to Democratic Party loyalists...

By David Mildenberg

August 18, 2025

Breaking: Federal judge sides with Riggs

A Trump-appointed federal District Court judge has ordered North Carolina’s Board of Elections to certify Allison Riggs’ victory over Jefferson Griffin in their battle for a state Supreme Court seat. Judge Richard Myers ruled that doing otherwise, given the facts of the case, would violate the equal-protection and due-process rights...

By Ray Gronberg

May 6, 2025

Sen. Measmer, arriving soon

Cabarrus County Commissioners Chairman Chris Measmer will take former Sen. Paul Newton’s seat, once Gov. Josh Stein formalizes the choice made by the county GOP. Word of the party executive committee’s choice comes from both the Concord Independent Tribune and the North State Journal. Measmer emerged as the pick from...

By Ray Gronberg

April 9, 2025

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